|
The Big One - I will be joining the glorious drag queen Lana Lamont for a guest slot to celebrate her birthday as part of a night of comedy, drag, great music and special guest performances. Saturday 28 March 2026, 8 pm, at the Cask & Keg, Scarborough. More details here.
The Scarborough Playwrights’ Room Showcase - an evening of groundbreaking homegrown writing from a range of voices, including The best lovers are good with their hands from Dancing in Heaven. Wednesday 6 May 2026, 7.45 pm, at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough. More details here. Writing the Bay - a two-hour creative writing workshop prompted by Robin Hood's Bay. Saturday 23 May 2026, 5.30-7.30 pm in Robin Hood's Bay. More details here. We've Always Been Here - a two-hour creative writing workshop prompted by Scarborough and North Yorkshire’s queer history. Saturday 20 June 2026, 3.00-5.00 pm in Scarborough. More details here.
0 Comments
 I will be joining the glorious drag queen Lana Lamont for a guest slot to celebrate her birthday as part of a night of comedy, drag, great music and special guest performances.
Other guests include poet Charlotte Oliver, drag queen Marlaine Desmond DelaRosa and musician and singer Oriana Phil Towart. The Cask and Keg, Cambridge Terrace, Scarborough YO11 2LQ at 8 pm on Saturday 28 March 2026. Tickets £8, including a free drink, available here.  My monologue, The best lovers are good with their hands, will be part of The Scarborough Playwrights’ Room Showcase, an evening of groundbreaking homegrown writing from a range of voices, including monologues, short plays, and scenes from larger plays, all written in and around Scarborough.
This showcase features writing from eight local writers, including wild comedy, mysterious drama, and moving monologues. Through the show, you'll see snapshots of wider works, some published, some entirely new. This show gives you the opportunity to directly support local creatives, and maybe even get involved yourself! All writing in the show has been developed and/or supported by local theatre creatives at the Scarborough Playwrights’ Room, a local writing group hosted by the SJT and run by Alfie Howle. The best lovers are good with their hands, published in Dancing in Heaven, tells the story of a young gay man who only finds out that he is HIV-positive when he meets a BSL interpreter in hospital. The performance is on 6 May at The McCarthy at the Stephen Joseph Theatre. Tickets are free and can be booked at the theatre and online.  Whether you are an absolute beginner or have been writing for years, come along to this LGBTQ+ friendly workshop and create stories prompted by Scarborough and North Yorkshire’s queer history.
Bring your own ideas or be inspired by stories, images and clippings showing that we’ve always been queer and always been here, from the ancient Romans to the present day. Saturday 20 June 2026, 3.00-5.00 pm, The Sitwell Library, Woodend Gallery & Studios £5/£7 per person, tickets available here A Big Queer Fringe Scarborough event, part of Scarborough Fringe See, I knew that would attract your attention. I'm working on a book with the working title 'Breasting Boobily', and it's about boobies.  Think Vagina Monologues but a bit higher up. People born with boobies and who love them or hate them. People who breastfeed for days, months or years. People born without boobies who get boobies for whatever reason. People born with boobies who have them taken away, also for whatever reason. People who have their boobies made bigger or smaller – for whatever reason. People with big boobies. People with little boobies. People with different sized boobies. I have never typed the word boobies this often before – blame Steve ‘The Hair’ Harrington in Stranger Things. Like Dancing in Heaven, this will be a collection of monologues that sit between fact and fiction. Most, if not all, of the pieces will be a mix of a number of different people’s stories and will be fully anonymised. I think it will be funny and sad and silly and bittersweet, and I’m hoping it will make a great performance too. I’m looking for people’s stories – straight people, queer people, older people, younger people. Performance stories. Everyday stories. Stories that everyone knows and stories that haven’t ever been told before. Contact me using my contact form or on Bluesky, Facebook or Instagram. I’d love to hear your story. PS – ‘Breasting Boobily’ comes from a parody of how some male authors write their female characters. The phrase was first posted by Tumblr user scottbaiowulf in December 2016: “Cassandra woke up to the rays of the sun streaming through the slats on her blinds, cascading over her naked chest. She stretched, her breasts lifting with her arms as she greeted the sun. She rolled out of bed and put on a shirt, her nipples prominently showing through the thin fabric. She breasted boobily to the stairs, and titted downwards.”   Whether you are an absolute beginner or have been writing for years, come along and create stories prompted by Robin Hood’s Bay and its surroundings. Bring your own ideas or be inspired by artefacts from Robin Hood’s Bay and Fylingdales Museum, newspaper clippings from the 1800s and 1900s, and beachcombing finds.
Saturday 23 May, 5.30-7.30 pm Part of the 3-Minute Arts Mini Arts Festival Fringe £5 per person, booking essential as places are limited - book your tickets here Wibury House, Mount Pleasant North, Robin Hood’s Bay, YO22 4RE (Wibury House – Fylingdales WI headquarters – is the first house on the left on Mount Pleasant North). Station car park is just the other side of Station Road  Jupiter Cloud Book Festival 28 February 2026, 11am to 5pm St Saviourgate Venue, Central Methodist Church, St Saviourgate, York, YO1 8NQ Find out more on the Jupiter Cloud website and book your tickets at Eventbrite Workshop schedule
11.30-12.00 The Power of Acrostic Poems - Molly Osborne Discover how the hidden structure of acrostics can kill writer's block and ignite your creativity. This fast-0paced, 30 minute workshop moves beyond basic adjectives to help you craft powerful, image-driven poetry. Whether you're a seasoned writer of a total beginner, come find your spark and leave with a masterpiece. 12.10-1.10 First Person Singular: Writing monologues that speak to an audience - Suzanne Elvidge Suzanne (yes, that's me) will guide you through creating a monologue - a story with a single voice - from idea to final draft. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced writer, bring along ideas or be inspired by prompts. 1.20-1.50 Creating Characters 101 - Rebecca Kelly Have you ever wanted to know how to make a good book character? Now you can with Characters 101! We will look at how to come up with names, back stories and the world that your character inhabits, and how to make your character truly feel alive on the page. 2.00-300 Build Your Own Adventurer: A DND-Inspired Poetry Workshop - goodnightthesky This fantasy-flavoured poetry workshop invites you to step into your power and conjure the heroic alter-ego of your wildest imaginings. Using Dungeons and Dragons mechanics, you'll be led through exercises that invite you to indulge in play, dig deep and create without fear. Whether you're an experienced poet or have never picked up a pen before, this aims to make poetry feel like an adventure you'll be excited to embark on! Talks schedule STORYTELLING WITH ELAINA MOON Join Elaina Moon for a special storytime and embark on an exciting journey through time with the ingenious inventor Amelia. With her amazing time-traveling trainers, Amelia ventures back to the era of George and Robert Stephenson, to a learn all about their history making locomotive 'Rocket'. HEALING WITH ART - Sarah Chayer This talk will take a dive into Sarah's struggles with anxiety and depression and her journey towards healing through poetry and art. She strives to reach others suffering from their own mental health hardships, to let them know they are not alone, and hopefully empower them to begin healing, themselves. CARPE DIEM - Jenny Oyston Jenny’s collection of poems, ‘Carpe Diem’ includes reflections on the passing of time, the natural world and an eclectic mix of other themes. She aims to entertain and to make you think by reading a variety of poems, both humorous and thought-provoking. MY ROLLERCOASTER JOURNEY INTO WRITING - Helen C Kelly Writing has always been Helen's dream let her tell you how she rode the rollercoaster so that she could achieve that dream & say she is an author. A TREE IN TIME - Pam Golden Pam writes from the heart, full of warmth and love. Discover the inspiration for her fascinating time-slip stories, set in our ancient past and imbued with nature’s magic.’ WE WON'T BE WRITTEN OFF - Written Off Publishing Written Off Publishing will talk about the threats facing indie and small presses, and how the processes in the arts community harm marginalised people and creators. BUT they'd also like to talk about how we can help each other and make our artistic communities healthier. HOW GRIEF BECAME AN INSPIRATION - D E Fox D E Fox - Becoming an author at 50 through grief. A story within a story. MAGIC, SOULMATES, AND FOUND FAMILY - Romy Morgan Romy will share the unusual story of how she wrote her magical queer romance series Fallen Feathers. Hear about writing drafts on a phone, going with the flow, and being so obsessed with your story that you end up writing three (very long) books in eight months! I WAS ALWAYS LUCKY - Mel Oyston Mel will be launching his latest collection of poetry, ‘Hidden Threads’ and his new series of Short Story Booklets. He’ll read a few poems, explain why writing is so compulsive and reveal the exact number of books he has read in his entire life. THE PLEASURES AND THE TERRORS OF WRITING CRIME - Linda Jones The truth behind the fiction. The pleasure and the terror of writing crime. DANCING IN HEAVEN - Suzanne Elvidge Dancing in Heaven celebrates the voices of the women who were there in the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980 and 1990s – the mothers, sisters, daughters, friends, lovers and professionals who cared, cleaned, cooked, coped, cried and campaigned. Suzanne Elvidge will talk about how the book began and how she created fictional monologues from real stories. WRITING YORK'S GHOSTS - Ben Sawyer A ghost story on every street corner and a monster at every gate. Urban fantasy author Ben Sawyer discusses finding the magical in York's snickelways. UNSPOKEN WORDS - Molly Osborne Molly is opening up her private notebooks to share the poems she once thought would never leave the page. Join her for an intimate session as she finally give a voice to the verses she's kept to herself. LOVE THROUGH TIME AND CULTURE - Poppy Kuroki Poppy discusses how relationships can thrive even between people who are completely different, whether by culture, beliefs, customs or language. She will share her writing process of developing the romance between characters from different eras and cultures and how this reflects real life. WHO AM I? - Jenny Oyston Jenny will explain how this book grew from her experiences as a counsellor. She’ll invite you to think about what makes you who you are today and describe a few of the exercises from the book. She’ll talk about how this can help you decide whether there is anything you’d like to change in order to get the most out of life. In very early 2021, as the UK was in its third national lockdown, Channel 4 and Russell T Davies’ drama series It’s a Sin hit the airwaves, about a group of young men living through that other viral pandemic, HIV/AIDS. We met Ritchie Tozer who was shaking off a conservative upbringing, the party boy Roscoe Babatunde, who was queer, black and beautiful, the shy, Welsh Colin Morris-Jones who brought such sweetness, and Ash Mukherjee, a confident character with a glorious smile.
It was an incredible piece of television – bitter and sweet, funny and heart-breaking. But the only woman who featured in any detail was Jill Baxter, based on Jill Nadler, Russell T Davies’ childhood friend and author of Love from the Pink Palace. While she was amazing, I wanted to know more about the women who were there. I wanted to hear their stories. An old friend of mine got in touch and told me a story I hadn’t heard before. She was a young nurse in the early 80s, and her first role at just 18 was in an infectious diseases ward in a London hospital. Did I want to hear her story? Of course I did. A fictionalised version became the monologue Dancing in Heaven. The reaction to this first piece when I performed it for the first time made me realise that I wanted to hear more, know more, write more, share more about the women’s stories that I knew must be out there. The stories that became the collection Dancing in Heaven came from oral histories, articles, news stories, interviews and between the wonderful pages of the call logs from Switchboard, the national LGBTQIA+ support line. Creating these monologues, which sit in the blurry spaces between fact and fiction, was a heartbreaking, wonderful and incredible privilege, and was only possible with the lovely people who helped me out by reading, editing, critiquing and providing encouragement and performance space, the amazing women who trusted me with their stories, the publisher Reconnecting Rainbows Press, and my wonderful wife Dee for her love, support and amazing cover art.  I will be at the Jupiter Cloud Book Festival in beautiful York on Saturday 28 February 2026 at St Saviourgate Venues with copies of Dancing in Heaven. There will be talks, workshops, bookstalls run by authors and bookish gifts to buy. Whether you're a reader, writer, or just curious, there’s something here for everyone. There's a Facebook Group with more details of the authors and other attendees. Tickets available at Eventbrite.   A great review of Dancing in Heaven from Bob the Bookerer on his YouTube Channel.
|
RSS Feed